I. Call to order
Ruth Jones called to order the meeting of the Campus Committee on Sexual Responsibility & Misconduct (CCSRM) at 11:05 a.m. on April 30, 2015 in Hameetman 225.
II. Members Attending
The following persons were present:
Ruth Jones, Richard Mora, Sara Semal, Karla Aguilar, Brian Erickson, Olivia Sabins, Maureen McRae Goldberg, Scott Bogue.
III. Title IX Office updates
Next meeting scheduled: Thursday, May 14 - 11 a.m.-2 p.m.: Discussion on policy/procedure revisions; recommendations from the Prevention & Education subcommittee.
The Title IX Office preliminary yearly report is in progress. This will be an opportunity for the Title IX Office to show the community the work that has been done this past year.
The draft of the Proposed Policy will be completed soon. We will have the Fall semester to get feedback from the Oxy community and the policy changes will be ready to go into effect in January 2016.
As a follow up to the initial climate survey results town hall, another town hall is scheduled for Tuesday, September 15, 2015.
We will also soon be addressing the aggregate reporting system that will be shared at the end of each semester. We will make a date available to the Oxy community so that people are aware of when they can expect to receive these reports. This will increase overall transparency with the Title IX Office.
IV. Discussion on Consent in our Sexual Misconduct Policy
1. Verbal Consent is irrelevant when the following are involved:
a. Incapacitation (if you don’t have the capacity to consent) and
b. Force (if someone is forcing you to say yes)
2. An idea from a CCSRM committee member was to provide real-life examples throughout the text about consent in the policy. Other institutions include examples in their policy, and this may help students understand what consent means in real-life situations. It was also discussed to have links in the policy lead to Project SAFE online educational resources in regard to other examples of consent in real-life situations.
3. In regard to the language that is used in the consent portion, some committee members agreed that it is too "lawyer like" and not easily to understand for those who are not familiar with legal verbiage. A recommendation was to use language that both meets the legal requirements but is also clearer and easier to understand than how the consent policy is current written. We can draft this in a way that is appropriate for all audiences. We asked the committee members to email us their suggested edits to the language by Thursday, May 7, 2015.
3. It was also discussed that consent is an objective standard: how would a reasonable, sober person evaluate whether the other person consents? When both parties are incapacitated, we look at the analysis by analyzing two things: First, was the complainant incapacitated? Evidence of incapacitation could include height, weight, how much they had to eat and drink, etc. and how much complainant had to drunk and or how much drugs consumed. The second element is whether based on what the respondent knew whether a reasonable sober person knew or should have known that the other party was incapacitated. The respondent’s incapacitation is irrelevant. When cross-complaints are raised, we have to do the same analysis for both complaints.
4. A verbal consent model is appropriate as an educational standard but there are difficulties in including an exclusive verbal standard for discipline.
5. Committee members to review consent provision and make suggested edits by May 7, 2015.